South Korea Tops OECD Countries in Higher Education Completion Rate for 15 Consecutive Years

Amid the social shock of the number of people who have given up on finding a job or not seeking employment after graduating from college exceeding 4 million, the highest number ever, it has been found that the rate of completion of higher education among young people has been the highest among member countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) for 15 consecutive years.

The Ministry of Education and the Korea Educational Development Institute released the main results of the ‘OECD Education Indicators 2024’ containing these contents.

Provided by Ministry of Education

The countries surveyed for this education indicator survey are 49 countries in total, including 38 OECD member countries and 11 non-member countries. The survey covers all aspects of education, including education finance, student and teacher status, and educational participation.

The research reference point is 2021 for education finance, 2022 for tuition, and 2022-2023 for students, faculty, educational participation, and performance. Education costs were measured based on the purchasing power parity index (PPP: 810.43 won in 2022) against the US dollar.

Higher Education Completion Rate

The higher education completion rate of Korean youth aged 25-34 last year was 69.7%, ranking first among OECD countries. It is a similar level to 2022 (69.6%) and higher than the OECD average (47.2%).

South Korea’s higher education completion rate has been consistently close to 70% since 2008, ranking first for 15 years. In 2019, it lost first place to Ireland (70%), but has maintained first place for 15 years after revising the figures.

Employment Rate by Educational Level

On the other hand, the employment rate by educational level last year fell short of the OECD average, just like the previous year. As of last year, the employment rate for high schools was 72.5% (OECD average: 76.9%), for junior colleges it was 78.2% (OECD average: 81.9%), and for universities it was 79.7% (OECD average: 86%).

According to the statistics released by Statistics Korea in July, the monthly average number of economically inactive people with a college degree or higher (including junior college graduates) in the first half of this year was 4,058,000, breaking the previous record since related statistics began to be collected in 1999.

Provided by Ministry of Education

Relative Wage by Education Level

When the wage of a high school graduate is used as the standard (100), the relative wage by education level in 2022 was lower than the OECD average. Middle school and below were 82 (OECD average: 82.1), junior colleges were 109.2 (OECD average: 120.4), and universities were 132.5 (OECD average: 141.6).

University Tuition Fees

Domestic university tuition fees have increased as of 2022. The average annual tuition fee for national and public universities was $5,171 (KRW 4.19 million), up 6.9% from 2019, and for private universities, it was $9,279 (KRW 7.51 million), up 7.1% from the same period.

Public universities ranked 6th highest among 24 countries that submitted data, and private universities ranked 5th highest among 13 countries.

Public Education Expenditure

As of 2021, the per-student public education expenditure was $15,858 (KRW 13,118,848), up 12% (USD 1,745) from the previous year. The OECD average was $11,902 (KRW 9,846,168).

Number of Students per Class

The number of students per class in Korea is 22 in elementary schools and 26 in middle schools as of 2022, a decrease of 1 in elementary schools and 0.1 in middle schools, respectively, compared to 2019. The OECD average is 20.6 in elementary schools and 22.8 in middle schools.

Provided by Ministry of Education